The First Time in Years
by Madhuri
Summary: Ron and Hermione try to cope with each other, and with just being alive.


The First Time in Years 

**Disclaimer:** This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. 

**Summary: **Ron and Hermione try to cope with each other, and with just being alive.****

***

It didn't strike me until we started living together how very _messy_ Hermione was.

It was a bit surprising, but I suppose I should have known it all along. Even back in Hogwarts, she wasn't the most put-together person I knew. Her hair would be flying in every which direction, her robes would be a little rumpled, and her expression always a bit worried, a bit distracted, a bit exasperated. Especially at me. I could always recognise her hands by the ink-smudges and deep marks imprinted by her many quills. When she worked, she surrounded herself with piles and piles of parchments, books, manuscripts. Sometimes they grew so high around her it would seem like she'd formed a protective barricade, prohibiting any living being from disturbing her concentration. The study materials were never organised in any particular manner. Every so often, Hermione would reach out, rummage about in a large pile of parchment, and tug out the exact one she needed, all the while without even looking up from whatever she was writing.

It didn't really catch my interest then, what Hermione did. After all, this was her. Always working, always learning, always busy… she didn't have time for frivolities like making sure everything on her desk was perpendicular. No matter how many times she expanded the interior of her satchel, it would always be bulging to the brim with books thrown in haphazardly. That bag would make her stoop over a bit as she walked, always fast, leaning a bit forward, always in a hurry to go where she wanted to go. She would talk a lot as she walked, and sometimes rub her eyes tiredly and leave a large ink-stain above her eyelid. I'd notice and grin, and she'd become angry at me for laughing at her sleep-deprived ramblings.

When the war got over, I think the only thing on Hermione's mind was sleep. She slept for so many hours. Everywhere. In the bed in her flat, on the sofa at the Burrow. Sometimes she got so tired she'd just put her head down on a table and start snoring.

We all had our own ways of coping, I suppose. As for me, I just sat. I sat and read a bit, thought a lot. I thought about the price that everyone had had to pay for me being able to just… sit. In peace. I tried to imagine what it must have been like to pay that price. The way Ginny must have struggled when the interrogation charm scorched her tongue and left her mute. What must have gone through my father's mind when he was framed and imprisoned. The expression on Harry's face when all traces of his magical ability were drained away from him. Percy's last thought before he took his own life, in a desperate bid to save us all.

 Everyone lost something, in that war. An arm, a leg, a heart, a home. Something. Even old Crookshanks had been taken away. 

But I hadn't been forced to lose anything. I still had Hermione. And that was more than I could ask for, anyday.

When I first started living in my new flat, Hermione would come over every once in a while. She would survey it with a critical eye and I'd blush and fumble and remind her how real estate prices these days are murder and how I was lucky to get accommodation in a neighbourhood with so few Muggles. She'd ignore my ramblings and tell me that if only I positioned the sofa like _so_, I would have a lot more open space in the living room.

She seemed to know many space-saving techniques, probably because she'd been living in a cramped little studio flat for a year already. Over the next week, she helped me re-arrange all my furniture, expand my closets and she even hung a few pictures on the walls. At the end of the week, I found that I no longer had to shower in the kitchen.

Harry came over a few times too, but he didn't help much. He just commented on the horrid view.

I decided to scrape together some money and arrange a little house-warming party for some friends and family. The party was nice and pleasant, and the guests murmed appreciatively on what Hermione and I had done with the place, and wolfed down their dinners hungrily. Many of them stuffed the extra bread rolls in their pockets before they left. I then flew Harry back to his house (far nicer than any of ours) and Apparated back to mine. Hermione had not left, she was stretched out across the sofa, breathing deeply and asleep to the world. I covered her up with a thin blanket and nudged the sofa closer to the fireplace. I sat in an armchair next to her all night, too tired to go to sleep.

She visited me quite often, those first few months. She told me how she hated her flat, which was pathetically tiny with barely any heating and horrid neighbours. She didn't want to use magic on the place as the nosy landlord kept barging in on one pretext or the other, and we never really did get a chance to learn about Muggle-repelling charms at Hogwarts, did we?

She took naps, and caught up on her work, and showered, and often stayed the night. We didn't discuss the arrangements. She was always welcome, as was Harry, although he didn't visit much. One night, as she slept on the sofa, I Apparated into her flat. Slowly, I brought back all of her belongings, one by one, back to my flat. It took me hours. When she woke up, and noticed her clothes and books and furniture surrounding her, she didn't say anything. She just reached up and hugged me, unexpectedly, for the first time in years, and went to get dressed. 

Over the next week, it took us an incredible amount of ingenuity and imagination to fit her things around mine. She refused to give up any of her books, and I refused to give up any of my furniture, so we gave away everything we didn't care for. Ginny, who had also recently found a place to stay, got the most of it, and was happy.

The morning after we finally settled in, Harry walked in through the door. He saw us at the breakfast table, tired and sleepy and in our bathrobes and sharing a few pancakes, and he grinned. For the first time in years.

Living together should have been awkward for us, given our history together. But it wasn't. Our relationship didn't really change. We'd wake up, and eat breakfast, and get dressed, and she'd go off to repair the Ministry. She didn't earn much, doing what she did. She supervised the reconstruction because she felt she had to, and because no one else had the interest or the capabilities. It was almost fanatic, the way she worked at it. As if by repairing some old building she could repair her own life. Being who I was, with no qualifications or no real vocation, I'd hang around Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade or any other place where I might find an odd job or two, just like the dozens of other unemployed wizards desperate for money.

Sometimes it would all get too depressing and I'd go off to spend time at Harry's house. He'd pour me a drink, and we'd sit, and we'd talk, and he'd tell me to buck up, I'll find a job soon enough. And I'd stare out the window at his spectacular view and think, Well, he may not have his magic, but he does have his inheritance. And I'd feel guilty and terrible for even thinking of such a thing, and I'd gulp down my drink and say goodbye and go back to Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade or any other place to try and find some money of my own.

Hermione and I would be home again by evening, and we'd cook a small dinner and eat and talk and maybe watch a bit of the news on her telly, and fall asleep on our respective beds. Living with her was nice, and comfortable. Sometimes, I just felt content watching her relax a bit for the first time in years. 

Sometimes I wanted more than contenment. When she was bent over her work, scribbling and reading and talking to herself, I would think back to the time when I was at full liberty to just take her hand and whisk her off to some empty classroom, where we'd laugh and tease and grope and be sixteen. And I would miss Hermione with an ache that surprised me, as I saw her everyday and had no reason to miss her.

For the first month, everything was quiet. It was a bit of a struggle to adapt to each other's habits and moods and likes and dislikes, all within that very small space we had, but we managed. After the first month, though, it became a bit nerve-wracking. Hermione was messy, I realised. Quite messy. Her books would be spread over the coffee table, over the dining table, over the kitchen counter, they would even be in the bathroom. Her robes frequently found their way into my closet. She sometimes left the house-keys in the flower pot. Now, I might not be a neat-freak like Percy was, but I am my mother's son, and I know that the newspaper is _not_ supposed to be tucked into the shower rack. 

Inevitably, we soon blew up at each other, for the first time in years. It was a rather ugly fight, which both of us screaming our throats hoarse. We paced around and around the tiny bedroom, faces red and flushed and angry and tired and so fed up. Hermione at one point screamed "You are so _infuriating!_" and threw a pillow at my head. I stood, stunned into silence for a few moments, before I grabbed it and threw it right back at her. She caught it and charged at me, shoving me down onto my bed. I snatched another pillow and soon enough we were engaged in a full-blown pillow fight.

After a few minutes of silent scuffling, I had Hermione flat on her back, her arms pinned above her head. I sat astride her, the bed creaking under our combined weights. "Ha," I said, and stuck out my tongue. She rolled her eyes. We stared at each other for a few seconds, then burst out laughing.

I let go of her hands and she sat up, still laughing. I suddenly realised that our faces were only inches away. I took a deep breath, gathered up what courage I had left, leaned forward and kissed her. She wrapped her arms around my neck and let out a little sigh. I laid her down on the bed, my body pressed on top of her, and felt myself sinking into her, into Hermione. I felt her breathing, and her heartbeat, and her scent overpowered me and took me back to when life wasn't bleak or grey or tired. It had been confusing and uncertain, but it had also been colourful and rich and vibrant, with sparkling brown eyes and Common Room fires and family and hormones and ink-stained hands. We didn't say much that night, or do much, we just lay together for hours, with our arms wrapped around each other, silently competing for the bedcovers.

The next morning she opened her eyes and yawned. I pulled her closer to me, not only because I was feeling clingy and besotted but also because the heating seemed to have broken down again and I very much needed to get warm. She ran a finger lazily up and down my arm, and I shivered, despite the fact that I was warming up quite well. She turned over onto her back and smiled, her eyes crinkling. "What do you think, Ron? Can the Ministry survive a day without me?"

For the first time in years, I was happy again.

***


End file.
